This is a place for the students as well as the lovers of literature. I endeavour to post articles on the core and important areas of English literature to help the students to understand and assimilate them precisely and correctly without confusion. I would also like to share my ideas with them and inculcate in them a passion for literature.

Wednesday, 22 April 2015

Humanism and some important questions and their answers

Humanism

1)Write a brief note on the basic concept of Humanism.

Ans. Humanism is an active ethical and philosophical
approach to life focusing on human solutions to human issues through rational
arguments without recourse to a god, gods, sacred texts or religious creeds.
Most generally, it refers to any philosophy that emphasises human welfare and
dignity and is optimistic about the power of human reason. Humanism has become
a kind of implied ethical doctrine ("-ism") whose sphere is expanded
to include the whole human ethnicity, as opposed to traditional ethical systems
which apply only to particular ethnic groups.

2) What do you mean by Renaissance Humanism?

Ans. Humanism as a philosophical, cultural and social
movement in Europe has its root in Renaissance. This sweeping movement across
Europe is known as Renaissance Humanism. Renaissance humanism was a cultural
movement in Europe from the mid-14th century Italy
(particularly
Florence) to the mid-17th century England. The humanist
movement developed from the rediscovery by European scholars of Latin literary
and Greek literary texts. Initially, a humanist was simply a scholar or teacher
of “studia humanities” that involves grammar, rhetoric, history, poetry and
moral philosophy as studied via Latin and Greek literary authors. The return to
favour of the pagan classics stimulated the philosophy of secularism, the
appreciation of worldly pleasures, and above all intensified the assertion of
personal independence and individual expression.

3) Trace the growth and development of Renaissance Humanism
as cultural movement.

Ans. According to the Renaissance humanist, classical world
of the antiquity was the pinnacle of human achievement, especially intellectual
achievement, and should be taken as a model by contemporary Europeans. The
intellectual heritage of the ancient world had been lost due to the fall of Rome to Germanic invaders
in the fifth century. The only way in which Europeans could expect to pull
themselves out of this intellectual catastrophe was to attempt to recover,
edit, and make available these lost texts, which included, among others, almost
all the works of Plato. The return to favor of the pagan classics stimulated
the philosophy of secularism, the appreciation of worldly pleasures, and above
all intensified the assertion of personal independence and individual expression.
Thus Renaissance Humanism emerged as a cultural force and held sway over
European literature, art and culture of succeeding centuries.

4) Mention the remarkable figures of Renaissance Humanism in
Europe.

Ans. Desiderius Erasmus
(1466-1536), one of the greatest humanists, occupied a position midway between
extreme piety and frank secularism. Francesco Petrarch (1304-1374) represented
conservative Italian humanism. Robust secularism and intellectual independence
reached its height in Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527) and Francesco
Guicciardini (1483-1540). Rudolphus Agricola (1443-1485) may be regarded as the
German Petrarch. In England, John Colet (c.1467-1519) and Sir Thomas More
(1478-1535) were early or conservative humanists, Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
represented later or agnostic and sceptical humanism. Besides, there were
humanists like Sir Philip Sidney, Edmund Spenser and John Milton representing
spirit of Christian humanism. In France, pious classicists like Lefèvre
d'Étaples (1453-1536) were succeeded by frank, urbane, and devout skeptics like
Michel Montaigne (1533-1592) and bold anti-clerical satirists like François
Rabelais (c.1495-1533).

5) Mention the major texts that
contain the beliefs and values of Humanism.

Ans. Giovanni Pico della Mirandola’s
An Oration on the Dignity of Man is taken as seminal text in the
development of humanism. In it, he talked about how God created man and that
man's greatness comes from God. He said that man was like a chameleon. It meant that he
could become whatever he wanted to be. He speaks of the infinitely possibility
hidden within man. In England, Thomas More’s Utopia, which shows the way
of creating an ideal heaven on earth, represents Renaissance spirit of
worldliness. Bacon’s essay like Of Truth, Of Study etc. take a
worldly and pragmatic attitude to life. Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus
represents a Renaissance man’s craving for knowledge, wealth and physical
beauty.

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